Sandcastles
by smartybear2
Summary: Kasumi finds Akane's old beach toys in her room and returns them to her - along with her memories of building sandcastles.


Sandcastles

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 _Akane looked down again and saw that the waves ended just a few feet from where their trench had begun. By nightfall, the waves would cover the castle completely. Then it would be gone._

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All characters are property of Rumiko Takahashi , Viz, etc... I just do this writing for fun because I love Ranma ½ so much! This is my second fanfic, after "Spring Showers." I hope you enjoy reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it! C&C are most welcome... (flames, too - but no infernos, please!)

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The bright blue of the sky was now slowly deepening into a shade of periwinkle. In the distance, the clouds, wispy and few as they were, had taken on a hue of pink and light orange, borrowing from the glare of the late-afternoon sun. The sea, so calm and blue, gently sang a duet with the breeze; the only sound breaking the serenity of the afternoon were the sweet murmurs of the waves kissing the shore and rising inexorably higher.

Akane sat on the golden sand high up the shore, her legs tucked under her, gazing reflectively out into the water. A large straw hat decorated by a white sash perched on her blue black hair, the ribbon's tails whipping gaily with the sea breeze. She was smiling absently, simply drinking in the beauty spread out before her.

Much as she enjoyed spending time with her family, she was also glad of this short time alone. It was times like these when she could feel the peace seeping into her, calming her, and making her whole. She always came back from sessions like these with a clearer mind and a clearer sense of who she was.

She closed her eyes and took a deep breath to inhale the sweet ocean air. It was laced with a faint smell of Kasumi's delicious cooking. She smiled, suddenly being reminded that she really wasn't as alone as she made herself out to be. Her senses brought into awareness by thoughts of Kasumi's cooking, she could suddenly hear Ranma's voice screaming insults at his father as they sparred behind a sand dune in the distance, well out of reach of the water. Squinting at the cottage, she was sure she could make out the forms of Nabiki and her father playing poker on the porch.

Thanks to her ingenuity, Nabiki was able to "borrow" a seaside cottage from one of the numerous people who owed her something. The cottage, though rather small, was just right for all the Tendos and both Saotomes to fit into. It was on a private beach - something that Akane was very happy about. She considered this trip to be a well-deserved break from the constant chaos that had swirled around Nerima since Ranma and his father had arrived… a quiet time to take advantage of all the sun, the sea, and the sand had to offer.

An unearthly screech suddenly pierced the peaceful afternoon. Startled, Akane looked up and saw two seagulls so gracefully flying side by side, squawking at each other as they disappeared into one of the crevices in the sheer cliffs just off the shore. She smiled ruefully to herself. She could never, for the life of her, figure out just how such beautiful birds could make such an awful noise. Their squawks always reminded her of a fishwife screaming, "Baka! Baka! Baka!" at her husband.

She laughed aloud at the thought, suddenly remembering someone who also constantly spouted off that particular phrase and whom she said it to.

"Something funny, Akane?" said a sweet voice above her. Akane opened her eyes, moments ago squeezed shut by mirth, to see Kasumi peering down at her with a serene smile on her face. In her hands, Kasumi held a blue plastic toy bucket and two child-sized shovels. Akane's eyes widened in delight.

"Oneechan!" she exclaimed, reaching for the toys. "I remember these! Where did you find them?" Without waiting for an answer, Akane took the toys from Kasumi and crawled a bit further down the shore to where the sand was moist but still out of the reach of the playful waves. Kasumi laughed as Akane quickly began filling the bucket with sand. "Oh this is so much fun - I haven't built a sandcastle for such a long time, not since we were at the beach with Mother."

Akane was surprised when she felt Kasumi stoop down and take a seat on the sand beside her. She stopped what she was doing for a moment to shoot a look of puzzlement at her eldest sister. "Oneechan… uh… shouldn't you be inside the house preparing dinner?" Akane asked hesitantly as she watched Kasumi take the other shovel and add more sand into the bucket Akane had already began filling.

Kasumi laughed again as she took the other shovel. "Don't worry, Akane, I started dinner earlier so I could make it down here in time to watch the sunset. It's on the stove, just waiting to be served," she said. "When I heard from Nabiki that you were down here, too, I couldn't resist taking these to you. I meant them to be a surprise - I found them in my room when I was cleaning up a few months ago, and I thought I'd give them to you the next time we were at the beach." Akane missed Kasumi's wise smile as she watched her younger sister dig a deep trench to protect the beginnings of her sandcastle then tip over the filled bucket to form her first tower. "You always loved doing this."

They worked in silence, Kasumi's soft, white hands slowly and methodically shoveling sand into the bucket, while Akane's jerky, eager movements making more sand spill back to the sand rather than the bucket. The orange cast of the setting sun bathed them with its fiery light, making everything seem like a scene from a dream. In a just few minutes, Kasumi and Akane had three towers formed between them, a fortress slowly rising up from the sand. They had always worked well together, even when they were little girls.

Akane glanced behind her and smiled at the long familiar shadows she saw - two girls sitting on the sand with a castle and a bucket in between them. She remembered this! It was just like when she and Kasumi would sit at the beach till nightfall building the highest, nicest sandcastle you ever saw. A puzzled frown crossed her face - did Nabiki build sandcastles with them, too? Somehow Akane didn't think so, but she seemed to remember three shadows on the sand all those years ago.

"Do you remember, Akane?" Kasumi asked her, tipping over another bucket of sand on top of the middle tower, to make it rise above the other two. "When all five of us went to the beach, the two of us spent every afternoon building sandcastles while Nabiki wandered along the shore with her own bucket collecting sea shells and other 'treasures.' We would build the sandcastle as high up the shore as we possibly could, but come the next morning -"

"Come the next morning, we would find the sandcastle washed away by the tide during the night!" Akane stood up and stretched a bit, the shovel in one hand and her other hand on her hat to keep it from flying away. "I remember, Oneechan! I remember... I remember how I'd drag you along the shore, not quite believing the castle was gone, hoping that maybe we got the spot wrong and that it was still there on the beach, just waiting for us to return to it. But it was always gone."

Kasumi put her shovel down and a wistful expression came over her serene face as she stared out into the distance, watching the sun, red now, slowly dip into the horizon. "You cried every single time we couldn't find our sandcastle," Kasumi told her, not noticing as Akane sat back beside her once more and began deepening the trench in front of their castle. "You always ran back home to Mother, asking her where the castle had gone. She simply smiled, picked you up, and promised you that she would help you build a new one." She looked at Akane, who had a surprised look on her face. "Don't you remember that, Akane?"

Akane's face suddenly became sad. "No - no, I… I think I do remember. She was the third shadow, wasn't she, Oneechan? It wasn't Nabiki, it was... it was Mom. She was there every afternoon, too, building sandcastles with us, wasn't she?"

Kasumi nodded, watching Akane closely.

Akane dropped the shovel onto the sand, slowly stood up, closed her eyes and tried to recall a scene like this one, with two little girls and a woman sitting on the sand with a sandcastle between them. Suddenly it was there - and all Akane could see was her mother's gentle smile.

"If this sandcastle ain't here tomorrow morning, I'll never make another sandcastle again," little Akane had said with a defiant look on her face. "I don't like the waves taking them away all the time after we work so hard on them."

Her mother had laughed. "Akane, you have to learn to accept that the waves are always going to do that, no matter how strong or how high we build our sandcastles. But, look, you don't hear Kasumi saying that she'll never build another sandcastle again, even if she's had her castles taken away by the waves a lot longer than you have."

Akane's bottom lip had thrust out petulantly. "Only three years, Mommy," she said.

Kasumi and her mother had laughed at Akane's rebellious expression. "Here, baby, climb into Mommy's lap and give her a hug," her mom had said, dropping the shovel and opening her arms. "And if the sandcastle is gone tomorrow morning, I'll help you and your Oneechan build another one. What do you say?"

Akane had cuddled into her mother's waiting arms. "I love you, Mom."

"And I love you, Akane-chan."

The setting sun cast an orange glow about them, making everything seem as if it were a scene from a dream.

"People shouldn't be afraid of building sandcastles," Kasumi suddenly said as she put finishing touches on the wall of the castle she and Akane had been building and stood up. "Mother always told me that the important thing was that, no matter where the castle went afterwards, you could always keep an image of it here..." Kasumi reached out and gently touched Akane's forehead. "And here." And she reached out and gently touched Akane's chest, right above her heart.

Akane's eyes snapped open. "But I'm not afraid of building sandcastles, Oneechan!"

"Do you realize that this is the first time since Mother died that you've built a sandcastle with me?" Kasumi pointed out. "The first time we visited the beach after Mom passed away, I brought the bucket and the shovels out and invited you to join me in building a sandcastle on the shore..."

Suddenly recalling that day, Akane looked down at the castle between them and felt tears fill her eyes. "And I said that I didn't want to because Mom wasn't there to build it with us... and why bother because it was going to disappear anyway, just like..."

"Just like Mom," Kasumi said quietly. Silence hung between them as they both looked out into the horizon, watching as the last crescent of orange light disappeared into the ocean. "But Mom isn't really gone, is she, Akane?"

"No," Akane said, looking at Kasumi with a tearful smile. "She's here." She tapped her forehead. "And here." She tapped the spot over her heart, right where Kasumi had touched her earlier.

Kasumi nodded. "It's the building that's important," she said, smiling sweetly at her puzzled younger sister. "When we build, we build memories - and these become a part of us long after everything else is gone." She opened her arms to Akane. Akane rushed into them and gave Kasumi a big hug.

"I love you, Oneechan."

"And I you, Akane-chan." All of a sudden, Kasumi laughed. "Looks like our menfolk are hungry - I can hear Ranma's stomach grumbling from here."

Startled, Akane looked up from Kasumi's shoulder to find Ranma standing a few meters beyond them, rubbing the back of his neck with an awkward expression on his face. He looked like he was blushing, but she wasn't too sure. Akane felt her face began to flush - and to hide it, she bent to gather the bucket and the two shovels from the sand. She felt, rather than saw, Kasumi beckon Ranma to come closer to them. After a few more moments of hesitation, he began to slowly walk towards them.

"I better go see to dinner now, before Uncle Saotome turns my kitchen upside down looking for food," Kasumi said, taking the toys from Akane with one hand and pulling her up with another. Then she tipped Akane's face and smiled straight into her eyes. "Don't be afraid, little sister. Everything is already there, ready for you. All you need to do is take it," she whispered, touching Akane's cheek gently.

Comprehension dawned in Akane's eyes. "You weren't just talking about sandcastles, were you, Kasumi?"

With another of her wise smiles, Kasumi answered Akane's question by gently kissing her on the forehead. "Mother would be proud of you." She then turned to give Ranma a welcoming smile. "I'll see you both at dinner, okay?"

With a final wave, Kasumi was off for the house.

Ranma and Akane stared after her as she gracefully walked towards the cottage. The last light was quickly fading, the sky now a darker shade of blue. In the distance, the bright pink clouds were now deep red. Night was falling.

"Nice castle," Ranma said, hunching down to take a closer look at the castle Akane and Kasumi had built. Akane looked down again and saw that the waves ended just a few feet from where their trench had begun. By nightfall, the waves would cover the castle completely. Then it would be gone.

"It will be gone by tonight," she said, a wistful tone in her voice.

Ranma looked up at her, and there was a sad look in her eyes. Darn, but he just hated seeing that kind of look in her eyes... "Uh... I... uh... we can make another one together tomorrow," he told her, standing up beside her. She looked at him in surprise. Ranma felt his face grow warmer.

This time Akane was sure that he was blushing. She smiled brightly at him, her spirit suddenly soaring. "I'd like that very much, Ranma. Thank you."

"Uh..." he broke the silence and looked around, catching sight of the two seagulls Akane had seen earlier. "Look at those birds... don't you wish you could fly like that?"

"Yeah," Akane replied, suddenly shivering from the cool breeze. Concerned, Ranma moved closer to her and placed an arm around her shoulder. Akane stared at the two seagulls and smiled to herself. He really could be so sweet sometimes - especially when he wasn't really thinking.

"Cold?" he asked, peering down at her face and once again seeing her sweet smile.

"A bit," she said, leaning into his warmth. "I..."

Suddenly the seagulls squawked at each other once more. Ranma and Akane both winced.

"You know, I never can figure out how such great looking birds can make such an awful sound," Ranma said, covering his ear with one hand.

Akane laughed, recalling she had the same thought just a few hours earlier. "They sort of sound like..."

"YOU!" Ranma teased, laughing as well. "Baka! Baka! Baka..." he squawked. He trailed off feeling Akane tense, suddenly realizing that he just let his mouth run away from his brain once more. He braced himself, waiting for the wallop from Akane's hyperdimensional mallet. To his surprise, there was none.

"They sound like US," she corrected, tipping her head and smiling up at him.

A part of him just wanted to curl up inside that smile of hers and never leave. He shook himself mentally. What was he thinking? "Like I'm the one who screams like a fishwife all the time!" he said, laughing as Akane stuck her tongue out at him. Taking her by surprise, he swiped her hat from her head and began running towards the cottage.

"Ranma no baka!" she said, giving chase. But she was laughing too as she tried to grab the hat that Ranma held just within her reach.

As she watched the two of them laughing and running towards the cottage from the kitchen window, Kasumi smiled to herself and thought that she had better make sure that the bucket and the shovels were where Akane was sure to see them tomorrow.

Above Ranma and Akane's laughter, Kasumi was certain she could hear the ocean and the wind sing a sweet duet in the twilight - and the loving tones of her own mother's voice.

"I love you, Kasumi-chan."

"I love you, too, Mom."

\- fin -


End file.
